The Key Chased the Blade

After we'd gone shopping and Mrs. O'Neill halfway forced me into buying a dress and some ballet flats, we came home and ate dinner - or Mr. O'Neill's version of dinner, which was breakfast. Simon kept giving me "we need to talk" looks and I couldn't do anything in front of his parents so I gave him a bunch of "I'll talk to you later" looks. After dinner I changed out of my clothes and put on some PJ's after showering. Then Simon and I hung out in the entertainment center and played the Wii for a while.

"What happened last night?" Simon asked softly.

"A lot," I said, and I told him everything. I had been preparing for this moment all day and rehearsed it in my head for hours, but it still didn't come out the way I wanted it too. In my head, it sounded realistic, but this was just kind of crazy and unintelligible. And it took me a while, and I fought back the lump in my throat, but I managed it. It helped to focus on the Wii game.

Simon didn't say anything for a long time. So I said, "Why did you let me fall asleep in your bed?"

"It wasn't intentional." He wheezed a laugh. I looked over and Simon's face was as red as a stop-sign. "I kind of fell asleep too."

For some reason I found this hysterical and started laughing. Simon looked over, eyes wide. "What?" He panicked. "What's so funny?"

"Nothing." I settled down. Simon asked, "When did you get up and leave? What was that all about with you and my mom?"

"Sometime early in the morning. I kind of fell out of bed and knocked over your nightstand and landed on your colored pencils. Sorry about that, by the way."

"Oh, so that's why the box was dented."

"Anyway, your mom heard all the noise and found me and thought I was going to you because I had a nightmare, which was halfway the truth. Luckily she didn't see me in bed with you. So she decided to take me on a girl's night out."

Simon nodded. Then he looked concerned. "I didn't know where you went. I was really worried about you."

I looked away. "I was more worried about you."

We didn't say anything for a while.

Simon started to speak, but I cut him off. I knew he was going to talk about the banshee and I didn't want him to. I didn't want to accept it just yet. So I said something else that was weighing on my heart. "You know my mom, Simon?"

"Yeah," he said.

"She left before I could even get to know her. I've never went shopping with a girl before."

Simon chuckled. "I hope my mom wasn't too bad."

"She was fine. That's the thing. I never knew your mom was like that."

"She always told me she wanted a daughter," Simon noted. "She's too busy to have more kids though."

There was another silence because I couldn't think of anything to say. I felt my heart ache. So I said, "Can we have a mutual agreement that nothing has changed between us just because we slept with each other?"

"Well, that was a sudden change of conversation," Simon said. But he added, "Yeah, we can have that agreement. Nothing has changed at all."

"Good."

"Okay, good."

We played the Wii for a long while more before I finally gathered the courage to talk again. I knew though, that this couldn't go on. I had to talk about the banshee. I had to find a way to stop this. I had to.

Because if I didn't, Simon and John were going to die.